Through Different Eyes
by Drop Your Oboe
Summary: As they leave Oz for good, Elphaba tries to persuade Fiyero to believe his own teachings. postmusical oneshot, Fiyeraba fluff. -the title-stealing was unintentional...-


_The combination of Angel/Collins fluff, tea, and knitting have put me in a good mood- good enough to post some fluff of my own, which I know some of you wanted, and maybe help brighten a Monday or two. Cheers._

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With the help of a little remembered magic, the Scarecrow and the Witch were soon out of any part of Oz where people would see them. They stopped to rest under a huge tree, Elphaba sitting near the trunk. Fiyero looked at the ground, then sort of collapsed. Elphaba laughed at him. "Well, you try being straw," he said defensively, and threw a pinecone at her. "There's no need to coordinate yourself together to move. You just- move."

Elphaba was turning the pinecone over in her hands. "I didn't mean to turn you into a scarecrow," she admitted. "I just wanted to save you somehow. I didn't think it worked, though…"

"It did," said Fiyero, for lack of anything else to say. "And I'm alive. I have that much to be grateful for. I haven't thanked you yet," he added, almost to himself. "Um, thank you."

"We're even," she said, still turning the pinecone over, her eyes not leaving her hands. "I saved you, and you saved me. Ah, look at us." She laughed at herself. "I'm green, and you're straw. We're a regular pair of misfits, and we fit each other perfectly." She tossed the pinecone up, then placed it on the ground next to her, and looked up to find Fiyero looking at her strangely. He sighed heavily, as much as a creature without lungs could sigh, and looked back towards Oz, propping himself on his elbows. "Fiyero," said Elphaba hesitantly, "are you sorry you're here?"

He started, turning back towards her. "No, of course not! Why do you ask?"

She smiled uneasily, but didn't answer him, and stood, brushing pine needles off her skirt. "We'd better keep moving. Staying in one place is going to make me nervous while we're still in Oz." She offered him a hand up, surprised at how light he was, and they kept walking.

"You don't want to be here," said Elphaba a while later, not breaking her stride. The Scarecrow would have stopped had it not been for her hand in his, pulling him on.

"Of course I do," he said, hurt. "Elphaba, why don't you believe me?"

"You keep looking back, to Oz. To the Emerald City. To-" She let the sentence hang.

"Oh." He felt foolish now: he knew exactly what she'd been thinking. "No. It's just…" He shook his head.

"Tell me." Elphaba stopped and turned to face him.

He looked down, because he couldn't close his eyes, and took a few steps more, until he was past her, his back to her. "To tell you the truth, I do miss Oz," he said, "but not because of anything there. Because- there are things you can't do even if you're straw. I miss being human," he finished, with a shrug, hiding his nervousness- for he was so good at hiding things! "Scarecrows can't exactly-"

"What?"

"Elphaba-" Fiyero turned back to face her. "I almost lost you once. I never want that to happen again. Before you saved me, I'd been thinking. And I decided that if there was anybody I wanted to spend the rest of my life with, it was you. And if things had turned out differently, I think by now I'd have gotten up my courage to maybe ask you if you-"

He stopped there. He hadn't meant to say it all that fast.

Elphaba had a hand pressed over her mouth. "You would have asked me-"

"Yes. I think so." He didn't even want to say it. "But-" Tenderly, he put a hand up to touch her face, to smooth her hair back. "Feel that?'

She nodded.

"I can't." He turned away from her again. "I mean, I can tell that I'm touching something, but- it might as well be anything. And I doubt you want to spend the rest of your life with someone who can't- who doesn't-" He didn't know what he was trying to say. He stopped, and shook his head.

Fiyero heard her take two steps towards him; he almost thought that he felt her touch on his shoulder, so much as he could. "Yes I do," she said, her voice quiet, and trembling.

He lifted his head. "What?"

"Fiyero," she answered, walking around him, "no matter what you look like, you're still going to be _you_, and that's who I want." Her voice broke; she stopped and cleared her throat, and continued, "After all, it's not every day you find someone who calls you 'beautiful,' and means it."

His tone was blank. "But I'm a scarecrow."

"And I'm green. So? That's just what's on the outside," she said gently, "and that's not what matters. You taught me that yourself. It's just seeing through different eyes." She raised her hand to touch his cheek, and Fiyero flinched away.

"No- please don't…"

"You're ashamed," she said softly, and he nodded. "I don't care," she told him. "I love you."

She kissed him then, and the embarrassment at her lips against his rough cloth face almost took him under. He just felt sorry, sorry that he couldn't be better for her, and he longed to just be _normal_-

And suddenly he found that Elphaba's lips were warm against his, and he kissed her back, surprised. The next thing that hit him was the pain, and he broke away from Elphaba and stumbled and hit the ground, swearing. It felt like someone had beaten him. He rolled over with a groan, wondering who'd given him such a thrashing, and sat up as he saw Elphaba lying motionless. Wincing- moving was not easy- he made his way over to her, worried. Her eyes were closed. "Elphaba?" he said, stroking her hair back from her face. "Wake up."

With a shock he noticed his hand against her skin- his _hand_, not a glove, not straw, but flesh and bone and human, and at the same time she opened her eyes and said, "What just happened?" Her eyes opened wider as she saw him, and she slowly reached up to cover his hand on her face with her own hand. "It's you," she said, sitting up with a smile, "you're back," and Fiyero sank his face into his hands in delight and began to laugh. He pulled her up and spun her around, still laughing, and so was she, or she would have been had it not been for his mouth on hers, jubilant and breathless. When they parted she looked into his eyes with a start and giggled.

"What?" he asked softly. "What is it?"

"Your eyes," she said. "They've gone green."

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_I think they might've been a touch OOC. Either way, reviews would be quite lovely... pretty, pretty please?_


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